Event Contracts Evolve from Prediction Markets to On-Chain Trading Platforms

How does a society know what it knows?

From weight-guessing games at fairs to political prediction markets, and now to short-cycle Event Contracts that can be participated in on-chain at any time, event contracts have undergone a century-long evolution. Their core has remained unchanged: transforming diverse judgments about the future into prices, settled by outcomes. What has changed are the types of events covered, the barriers to participation, the trading cycles, and the underlying infrastructure.

Looking back along this trajectory, Polymarket made prediction markets a global internet product, while TurboFlow brought event contracts further into on-chain trading scenarios accessible to retail traders. Though at different stages and with different product forms, both have collectively propelled “trading the future” from an economic experiment to a mass-market product.

The concept of event contracts can be traced back to 1907. The British statistician Francis Galton observed that when a group of people independently estimated the weight of a cow at a fair, the collective judgment was remarkably close to the actual result. This story was later summarized as the “wisdom of the crowd”: when participants possess diverse information and their judgments are formed relatively independently, the aggregated outcome often comes closer to the truth than any single individual’s estimate.

Later, economists began to further consider: if market prices can aggregate information about the supply and demand of goods, could they also aggregate information about future events?

In 1945, Friedrich Hayek systematically articulated the informational function of price mechanisms in "The Use of Knowledge in Society." Knowledge in the real world is dispersed among countless individuals, and market prices compress these dispersed judgments and information into continuously changing signals. Following this line of thought, markets can not only price goods but also aggregate participants' judgments about future events through trading.

Event contracts apply this logic to future outcomes. Suppose a contract stating "an event will occur" is currently priced at $0.62, with a settlement of $1 if the event happens and $0 if it does not; the $0.62 price is typically interpreted as a market signal of the probability assigned to that outcome. Participants put their capital behind their judgment, and new information continuously flows into the price through trading.

Prices will still be influenced by liquidity, participant structure, market sentiment, and trading rules, making them better suited as real-time market judgments rather than absolutely accurate probabilities. This principle has guided the evolution of event contracts since their inception.

The important modern starting point for prediction markets appeared in 1988, when researchers at the University of Iowa created the Iowa Political Stock Market, which later evolved into Iowa Electronic Markets (IEM) to test whether markets could improve prediction accuracy through contracts tied to U.S. presidential election outcomes.

The early market size was small, and participation amounts were strictly limited. It demonstrated something important: even with a limited number of participants, prices can form a collectively valuable judgment if they are willing to trade based on new information.

In 1992, the IEM received a no-action letter from the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), allowing it to continue operating under small-scale, research-oriented conditions. For the first time, event contracts gained a relatively stable institutional space. In the years that followed, IEM prices were frequently compared with opinion polls, helping to bring prediction markets into the mainstream of economic research.

Following academic experiments, commercial platforms emerged. TradeSports and Intrade expanded tradable events to include elections, economics, entertainment, and international affairs, opening them up to a broader user base.

Intrade's value was noted during multiple U.S. elections. Media, researchers, and the public began viewing market prices as another signal beyond polls. More capital and participants led to more active price discovery, bringing prediction markets closer than ever to mainstream internet products.

Regulatory issues intensified. In 2012, the CFTC accused Intrade of offering unregistered commodity options to U.S. users. The platform subsequently ceased operations and shut down in 2013. The lesson from Intrade is clear: event contracts demonstrate real demand, and long-term growth requires compliant, clearing, and market infrastructure commensurate with trading volume.

During the same period, event contracts also touched upon ethical and public interest boundaries. In 2003, the Policy Analysis Market program, funded by the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, attempted to use markets to predict political and security developments in the Middle East. The project was quickly canceled due to public controversy. This incident reminded the industry that whether a contract can be traded also depends on the design of the underlying event, public interest, and social acceptance.

After Intrade shut down, restricted markets such as IEM and PredictIt continued to offer trading on political events. They have preserved the research and product flame of prediction markets, but are limited in user base, transaction size, and number of markets.

On the other hand, stablecoins, smart contracts, on-chain wallets, and automated market makers are gradually maturing. Event contracts are now built on a new technological foundation: global users can trade on a unified network, rules and settlement processes can be encoded into smart contracts, and markets can operate 24/7.

This sets the stage for the next wave of growth. Prediction markets are beginning to shift from “websites maintained by a single institution” toward composable, verifiable on-chain markets.

Polymarket launched in 2020, offering event markets on topics such as politics, macroeconomics, technology, sports, and culture, powered by stablecoins and blockchain infrastructure. Users trade "Yes" or "No" shares, with prices fluctuating based on supply and demand, and settlements are finalized once the event outcome is determined.

The changes it brought about were first evident in its distribution model. Prediction markets evolved from regional products into global internet-based platforms, enabling market prices to be routinely cited by media, researchers, and social platforms. During the 2024 U.S. election, Polymarket garnered unprecedented public attention, as event contracts became a frequently referenced data source in global news discussions.

The growth of Polymarket has also been accompanied by regulatory adjustments. In 2022, CFTC reached a settlement with the platform over its offering of unregistered on-chain event contracts and required it to address non-compliant markets. Since then, Polymarket has continued building a pathway into regulated markets.

In 2025, the parent company of the New York Stock ExchangeIntercontinental Exchange (ICE)announced an investment of up to $2 billion in Polymarket and plans to distribute its event-driven data. This partnership is symbolic: event probabilities formed by market trading are now being recognized by traditional financial infrastructure as data products that can serve their clients.

Polymarket has completed a significant migration in its event contract history—from academic research, niche communities, and gray areas—into the global mainstream financial and media landscape.

Parallel to on-chain pathways, Kalshi chose to start with a regulated exchange. It became a CFTC-registered designated contract market in 2020 and launched event contracts based on outcomes such as economic data, weather, politics, and sports.

In 2024, a U.S. federal district court overturned the CFTC’s ban on Kalshi’s election contracts. In May 2025, the CFTC withdrew its appeal, concluding the case. This has spurred rapid growth in the U.S. event contract market and ignited new discussions on federal and state regulation.

Entering 2026, event contracts have evolved into multiple parallel pathways: regulated centralized markets, on-chain prediction markets accessible to global users, and short-term products designed around price movements. Each product type corresponds to distinct types of information, participation methods, and risk structures.

The product scope of event contracts is expanding. Early markets primarily answered questions like “Who will win the election?” or “Will a certain policy pass?”; new products can also answer “Will the BTC price be higher or lower than the current level after a specified time?” Both types of contracts transform uncertain outcomes into clear conditions and settle according to pre-published rules upon expiration.

They aggregate different types of information. Political and macro events absorb news, research, and public information, typically over longer timeframes; short-term price events absorb real-time market data, volatility, order flow, and traders' directional sentiment, making them closer to high-frequency trading.

This evolution has made event contracts a universal product structure. Users can express views on clear outcomes without managing complex position parameters, extending the product experience from “finding an event worth predicting” to “quickly expressing directional views in familiar markets.”

The event contract market is evolving along different paths: one type of platform emphasizes institutional development and regulatory frameworks, enhancing market credibility through standardized rules; another type focuses on global accessibility and on-chain execution, reducing geographic and infrastructure barriers with transparent mechanisms; a third type is beginning to explore shorter-cycle, trading-oriented event products to lower participation barriers and improve capital efficiency.

TurboFlow represents a third category of exploration. It is an on-chain trading platform designed for global retail users, integrating Perpetuals, Event Contracts, and Prediction Markets into a single trading ecosystem, aiming to make professional trading products simpler and more accessible.

With TurboFlow's binary contracts, users can predict the price direction of assets such as BTC, ETH, and gold after a specified time period. Participation starts at just $2, with trades completing in as little as 30 seconds. Clear directional choices, fixed expiration times, and pre-displayed potential outcomes lower the barrier to understanding and execution.

TurboFlow also integrates event contracts into a complete trading ecosystem. Users can choose short-term Event Contracts based on their market outlook, or use perpetual contracts to manage longer-term directional exposure.

At the market infrastructure level, TurboFlow introduces professional market makers to provide liquidity and supports a more market-driven trading experience through on-chain transparent execution. Its product direction continues the price discovery logic emphasized by Hayek: judgments from different participants enter the market, and prices and odds adjust according to supply, demand, and information.

TurboFlow and Polymarket demonstrate two typical scenarios for event contracts. Polymarket enables users to trade on public events such as political, economic, and cultural outcomes, while TurboFlow further extends coverage to short-term market results and connects event contracts with perpetual contracts. As a result, event contracts now span a broader time horizon and reach a wider range of users with varying levels of experience.

Looking back on this history, the long-term value of event contracts comes from three elements.

First, the rules must be clear. The underlying asset, observation time, data source, and settlement conditions should be clearly displayed before trading.

Second, the market requires liquidity. The number of participants, the quality of market making, and order depth affect whether prices can promptly absorb information and impact users' actual trading experience.

Third, risks must be properly understood. Binary outcomes mean that gains and losses are concentrated at settlement, and short-term trading can amplify the impact of volatility and timing decisions. Market prices and odds reflect traders' judgments under specific rules and liquidity conditions, and should not be interpreted as guarantees of outcome.

These principles connect IEM, Polymarket, Kalshi, and TurboFlow. As technology and interfaces evolve, reliable rules, transparent execution, and sufficient liquidity remain the foundation for event contracts to scale.

From the 1907 crowd guessing games, to Hayek’s explanation of price mechanisms; from the 1988 Iowa Electronic Markets to Polymarket bringing prediction markets to blockchain, and now TurboFlow integrating short-cycle Event Contracts with perpetual contracts on a single platform, event contracts have undergone a long evolution from idea, to experiment, to market, to product.

This history also reveals why event contracts have continued to grow: people have always needed a simple way to express their judgments about the future. Today, event contracts can cover political outcomes months ahead or market movements just 30 seconds later. The time horizon has shortened, participation has become lighter, but the logic of price discovery remains unchanged.

If traditional prediction markets primarily aggregate participants' forecasts about the future through medium- to long-term event trading, then today's short-cycle event contracts extend this mechanism further to shorter timeframes and higher-frequency trading scenarios. ForTurboFlow, this evolutionary path points to a more specific goal: enabling more everyday users to participate in on-chain trading that is transparent, easy to understand, and supported by real market liquidity.